One Minute After You DieChikamu

In the Middle

“It is in the middle that human choices are made; the beginning and the end remain with God. The decrees of God are birth and death, and in between those limits man makes his own distress or joy.” - Oswald Chambers

Yesterday we read a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. We heard from Jesus that there’s a difference between spirit and body. Bodies will die, but our spirits live forever.

Jesus brought this up again in John 11:25-26 NIV when he said,

… The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. …

So yeah, death will happen, our bodies and souls will somehow separate, and then what? Then there is some kind of judgement. John mentioned a great white throne of judgement in Revelation, Jesus talked about separating sheep from goats in Matthew 25, and Paul called it the judgement seat of Christ throughout the New Testament. 

One day we will die, our souls will live on, and our lives will get a final review by Jesus Himself.

This is why what we believe about what happens when we die changes what we do when we’re alive. This is why we want to aim our lives toward eternity.

The Oswald Chambers quote at the beginning of today’s devotional refers to this life as “the middle.” He says what we do in “the middle” can make our own distress or joy. That’s true not just about today or tomorrow; it’s also true about forever.

One day our bodies will die, but Jesus said, “Whoever lives by believing in me will never die.” Living in the tension between these two truths is living in what Chambers called “the middle.” The way we live every day—in the middle—is our life’s best evidence that we believe what Jesus said and did about the end. We need to live with urgency, knowing that our lives are short, that it matters what we believe, who we tell, and how we live. Still, we who are in Christ should also live with peace, hope, and supernatural rest knowing that our souls will never die.

Consider: How does what I believe about the end change the way I live in the middle?